Tales of the Witch Clan - Part #1 (Blood Moon Rising and Ninja Nights)
John Stormm
Issue #2 (April 2008)
Blood Moon Rising
The windows of the family kwoon were open, letting the cool autumn air circulate freely within. The old man’s oaken practice sword never wavered, rapping a tattoo that shook him down in his bones. Jumping and whirling, long, silken, white hair streaming out like a banner, Jon’s father never tired of sword drills. A few more moments of such a brutal attack and he would be on his knees. Then without a word, his father lowered his weapon and stepped back.
“Dad!” Jon gasped, in the wake of his father’s attack, “I’ve got to catch my breath.”
“I could use a hot cup of sassafras.” the old wizard acceded. “Care for some?”
“What I want is cold and wet,” Jon panted, “on me, in me, all over!”
He shook his head. Where did his father get so much energy? He grabbed some bottled water from the fridge. Even though in the past year, he had shot up another inch or so, and was now taller than his dad’s six foot five inch frame, he couldn‘t keep up with the old man no matter how hard he tried. While serving as an Army Ranger in
So different. How did they ever manage to stay together as long as they did and rear four children? Jon smiled to himself.
“My karma ran over her dogma,” his father always said.
“We’re going to have to work on your transitions,” the old man broke in to his reverie, “both to and from an assassin’s grip. It’ll save your life, someday.”
“I suppose that’s possible, Dad.” Jon chuckled. “But I don’t get drawn into much lethal swordplay these days. After all, it’s the Twenty-first Century. They use Glocks and Ingrams now, instead of broadswords.”
“Be that as it may,” the old man countered, “there are some who won’t rely on machines that can fail, when they want to kill. The Blood Moon is coming.”
“Well, we’ll have to work on those moves later.” Jon gulped his bottled water. “I have to go take Mel and the twins to their doctor’s appointment by ten.”
* * *
Melanie was the eldest of Jonathan’s three sisters. While her husband, James, was at work, other members of the family would come by to help rear the newest clan members. The six foot tall Amazon had her mother’s dark eyed, raven haired, beauty and her father’s physical and spiritual disposition. Her first pregnancy netted them a pair of healthy twin boys. Years ago, their father proclaimed that she would be groomed as the clannad’s matriarch. She was the old man’s favorite, but you wouldn’t know it for all the hell he had put her through while expecting her to shine. Never once did she let her father down. She would die trying first, and like her father, that wasn’t likely to happen easily.
The regal matriarch of the Storm Witch Clan was up to her elbows in baby pooh.
Diaper changing time with the twins was not an event that Jon cherished. He loved his nephews fiercely, but his stomach had its own opinion.
“C’mon, Jon,” Mel snapped, “Shake a leg with those baby wipes or we’ll be late.”
“If I shake anyone’s leg” he gagged. “God knows what else may roll out of there!”
“Men can be such babies!” Mel laughed.
* * *
The boys were cleaned up and loaded into the minivan and on their way to their pediatric appointment in short order.
“Mel, I gotta talk about Dad,” Jon blurted out. When he had left his father at the kwoon, the old man had grabbed his great sword for even more practice. “He’s like a maniac with those swords of his lately. He mentioned something about preparing for the Blood Moon... What’s up with that?”
“It happens close to Halloween this year, Jon.” Mel explained, “It’s a great full moon for working curses. Around the time of Halloween, or Samhain as we know it, the veil is thinnest between the darkest worlds. I think Dad is worried about what may come through.”
“Shouldn’t he be practicing his spell craft instead?” he asked. “This will be a spirit thing, won’t it? What good are swords?”
“Two things, brother…” Mel said, raising an index finger. “One: Dad may seem somewhat eccentric to outsiders, but we know who and what he really is. Respect that.” Raising her second finger in a witch sign below her eyes, she said, “Two: Knowledge is power. You should go to the source of your questions and ask him. He’s your father, and the most knowledgeable wizard you’ll find on this topic.”
“It’s just that when I ask him stuff, like where and how he got those scars, he gives me some off-the-wall answer,” Jon complained, “and when I call him on that, he laughs at me and tells me the truth is even harder to believe. Also, I think I’m afraid of his answer, and I was hoping you would give me some normalcy,” he said sullenly.
“Normal?” Mel’s eyebrows arched, “In this family ‘normal’ is little more than a setting on the washing machine. I’m afraid to tell you that paranormal is as close as you’re going to get. We weren’t born for such things.”
“A couple years of Army life, and just seeing you taking care of the twins gave me a false sense of normal.” Jon laughed.
“I noticed that the normal act of changing diapers didn’t sit too well with you either, brother mine.” Mel giggled, as Jon faked gagging.
Gareth and Callum checked out fine with their pediatrician and got their shots, which made them cranky the rest of the day. Melanie had her hands full with their care and feeding. Jonathan was only too happy to help with mundane chores as he pondered his father’s obsessive behavior.
Later in the day, Becky, his second oldest sister, came upstairs to find Jon. Like his other sisters, Bex, as she was known amongst family, was about six feet tall, but with a willowy figure, as opposed to the harder frames of Melanie or the younger sister, Tori. Bex, with her mother’s looks she could’ve been a model, but was attending college to become a veterinarian.
“Dad called for you,” Bex said, “I didn’t know you were home, so I took a message. He said to meet him at Kidron for practice tomorrow.”
The mention of the brook Kidron meant that practice was going to reach extreme limits. Practice moves and simple sparring was done either in the kwoon or the backyard, but all the full contact moves were done on dead wood stands in the deep woods near the brook. The Storm kids had learned and practiced wood lore and martial arts there from the time they could walk. Evidently, Dad wanted all his sword moves at full power and flawlessly executed, and the place to do that was Kidron. Jonathan packed his swords and equipment for the next day’s work out.
By nine in the morning, Jon found his father hacking away with twin machetes on a large, dead sugar maple they used for shuriken target practice. The old man was stripped to the waist in his black jeans and cross trainers, with his hair in a long braid down his back. His silver clan medallion gleamed white at his throat in the morning sunlight. He was whirling like a dervish, hacking away at the trunk and numerous logs he had set up to simulate a standing army. Branches and chips flew in the still morning air as the machetes moved like twin circular blurs. He wasn’t even sweating.
Jon approached the clearing near the brook and placed his gear on the mossy bank.
“Reporting for practice, sifu!” Jon shouted, as he sorted through his battle bag for the appropriate equipment and weapons.
“Today, we’ll stick with the short swords,” the old man said, transitioning from a human buzz saw to a lecturing master in the space of a heartbeat, “to practice the transitions to and from an assassin’s grip.”
He had practiced these self same moves with his father since he was four years old, but the old man insisted that the technique needed something more to be effective. Jon wanted to talk to his Dad, but unless he was questioned directly, speaking was forbidden during the lessons. There would be plenty of time to chat during the breaks. Over and over again, the swords whirled in both hands, both overhand and underhand every time the old man barked. Showing the weakness in the move, the old wizard smacked at Jon’s blade in the middle of the transition and it stuck in the ground at his feet.
“As you turn the blade, keep your index and middle finger taut around the hilt,” instructed the old wizard, “and then tighten your complete fist on the hilt as it swings around into position. For an assassin‘s grip, your index finger positions the hilt, while your middle fingers stay taut, and then tighten your fist. ”
Again, the old man barked, and Jon reversed grip on both hands. It was looking better and felt more solid. The true test was completing the strokes on the fallen hardwoods that littered the forest after the last ice storm. Jon jumped, whirled and hacked at every branch that showed itself within his range. When his father barked, he would shift his grip, and in the process, sever the branches nearest to his arm. As always, the old man knew what he was talking about. It just took time and effort for Jon to understand its meaning.
“Dad, why are we doing this?” Jon asked during the break, while they sat on a stone near the stream.
“Because a swordsman, like his sword, must never lose his edge or he becomes obsolete,” the old wizard replied, while gazing steadily into the rippling water.
“We’ve practiced out here as long as I can remember.” Jon gestured at the woods, “I’ve never seen you push to this degree in all of those years. It was just a game we played as kids. We barely knew we were being trained in martial arts. But I know in my heart that this is serious, Dad. What’s it really all about? And how does it tie in with the upcoming lunar eclipse on your calendar?”
“In our culture, each full moon has its own name and characteristics through out the season,” the old man lectured. “Mostly in spell craft it is the new moon, or moonless nights on which evil curses are worked. The exception to this would be the Blood Moon, an eclipsed full moon, colored blood red. That could power a whopper of a curse to throw at someone.”
“You taught us in the craft,” Jon said, “that the Law of Threes makes it unwise for a true witch to send out curses, knowing they’ll come back threefold.”
“That’s true,” said the old man, “but I didn’t say we would be using curses. I’m talking about really bad, or foolish witches and warlocks.”
“But why the sword craft, Dad?” Jon asked. “Swords don’t stop curses.”
“Do you remember, about ten years ago, my study of the druid’s astrological wheel and rift energies?” the old man asked.
“Who could forget?” Jon reminisced.
It was a bright summer solstice when his father had used a combination of sunlight and magic focused into a crystal orb to open the rift in the Devil’s Bathtub to the mythic world of Gwynydd.
“Faeries came flying out of a big ball of light in your hands,” Jon went on. “We kids met Sundog for the first time that day, and Mel took his picture. You’re not anticipating fighting faeries with swords, are you?”
“Well, son, it was with cold steel that the early Irish settlers drove off the Tuatha Danaans from
Jon had been taught at an early age that fear had no place in him. When he began to feel the icicles forming in his gut, he employed the discipline his father taught him. He slowed his racing heart and his breathing and expelled the fear for his enemies to breathe in. Sword practice continued for the remainder of that morning until his muscles burned from the exertion. The old man still showed no sign of weariness.
* * *
The Blood Moon would happen an hour before midnight on Wednesday night. The old wizard determined that if the rift would be opened, that it would happen in one of two places locally. The Devil’s Bathtub in nearby
* * *
About ten o’clock on Wednesday night, Melanie and James loaded the twins into the four-by-four. Jon put his battle bag with his swords and equipment in the back and climbed into the rear seat next to the boys. In spite of all the jostling, they were fast asleep. Melanie was virtually dripping in silver jewelry. James and the babies also were wearing silver charms of one sort or another.
“I take it that the swords won’t be enough for tonight,” Jon observed worriedly.
“Dad has something special for you two,” Mel replied from the front seat. “We won’t be going into the woods with you, but our prayers will. Dad’s more experienced at this sort of thing. Take your cues from him.”
They pulled up to the wooded section on the eastern end of the reservoir. The well used, old Chevy van sat like a squatter just under the trees. There was no sign of the old man, but with his predilection for wearing nothing but solid black on black, Jon anticipated not seeing him until the wizard wanted to be seen.
He climbed out of the vehicle and grabbed his gear from the back. Melanie got out and sprinkled salt on the vehicle and him as she prayed. He strapped his swords crosswise over his shoulders and buckled on shin and arm guards.
A looming shadow caught his attention. Startled, he looked up. The old man stood beside him looking intently from under the broad brim of his black leather hat. Silver bosses circling the hatband gleamed whitely in the moonlight. In his long, black leather duster he looked like a highwayman of old. Ominous protrusions over each shoulder shown that he, also, was literally dressed to kill. He laid out on the hood of the four-by-four the large bundle he carried.
“It’s going to be unnaturally cold in these woods tonight, son,” the old man explained, “so you’ll want to wear these too.”
The bundle consisted of an old trench coat his father used to wear when Jon was a little boy. It had been mended a thousand times and been around the world in his father’s travels almost as many times. A silver medallion with mage runes etched into the metal lay on top of a pair of black leather gloves with silver plates riveted to the backs of the hands. A black felt hat with a silver studded hatband completed the ensemble.
Jon chuckled.
“What’s so funny, son?” the old man asked.
“It’s just that, if we get stopped by the police, we’ll never convince them that we are not pimps from hell.”
“No cop in his right mind will want to go where we are going tonight,” said the wizard, “so that won’t be a problem.”
Mel kissed them both, and tossed salt on them before they left into the darkness of the woods.
“Give ‘em hell, guys,” she called out. “They asked for it.”
Dressed and ready for battle, they turned as twin towers and strode quietly down the path that led into the woods. In the dappled light of the full moon, strange silvery sigils seemed to flicker across his and his father’s coats. God alone knew how many times the old wizard had charmed them. Prominent amongst all the runes was the upward pointing spear of Tyr, the rune of the spirit warrior. It took on a significant meaning at this point in time.
“Tonight, I am my father’s son,” he said quietly to himself.
The time of the Blood Moon was fast approaching. Already, a tinge of red was showing on the moon as the earth moved between it and the sun. It was confusing in these woods at night. Trails wound and turned back on themselves, and the sounds of whispered chants came from all directions.
“We’ve got to find the rift area and contain the dark fae before they start for the city streets,” the old wizard stated as he pulled out a small crystal orb, about an inch and a half across. Standing in a crossroad clearing, and using his silver medallion to shine the moonlight into the crystal in his fingers, he called out, “Sundog, we’re going to need your assistance if we hope to stop this abomination in time.”
Like a trick of the eyes, a blue glint of light shot out of the crystal and into the woods to their right. As they followed, the moon grew increasingly red. Their silver accouterments gleamed angry red in response to the Blood Moon. Whispered chants grew louder just up ahead of them. The woods were beginning to feel very crowded.
The odor of an acrid, metallic incense wafted from a glowing brazier in the small clearing ahead. Upon hearing the soft “shshing” of his father drawing his swords, Jon likewise drew his own. Tonight, they chose the short, leaf shaped, double edged Celtic war swords that would suit the close contact fighting in the woods. The twin blades gleamed red in the tainted moonlight.
“If you leave the door open like this,” the old wizard called to the shrouded figure standing at the brazier, “you can never tell who will show up.”
“No worries,” a sibilant male voice rasped and the figure gestured broadly. “I was prepared for uninvited guests.”
From around the clearing, figures moved towards them, barely discernable in the dimness of the available light. There was something wrong with the large man sized silhouettes that Jon couldn’t pinpoint.
“Dog soldiers!” exclaimed the old man at his side.
“No werewolves?” Jon quipped nervously.
“I would have preferred werewolves,” the old man grumbled. “They aren’t as organized as these. It’s going to get hairy. Be sharp.”
An ominous communal growling came from all around them. Into the red light of the full moon stepped the first dog soldier. It appeared humanoid in general configuration, but the similarity ended there. Its furred body stood seven feet tall, with the strange shaped legs and feet of a large hound, and its head looked like a collie with the mange. Further, it was dressed in a leather jerkin with brass plates attached. The creature’s large clawed hands extended to grapple or rend flesh.
The old man whirled under its hands and slashed at its midsection twice. As the fur and flesh parted from the blades, a greasy, almost liquid smoke oozed out and the figure collapsed in on itself.
“At least they can die,” Jon said, and then he was too busy to talk.
The creatures encircled them and tried to grab at them from all directions at once. The whirling techniques the old man had stressed so much proved to be the bane of the dog soldiers. The filthy smell of dog smoke filled the woods. When the beasts got past their guards and swiped with razor sharp claws, the slashes in their coats smoldered as if sprayed with acid.
One creature managed to grab the old man’s arm and bit him as he was dealing a death blow to another. The scratches were deep and blistered immediately, and the bite festered ominously. Howling with pain, the wizard hacked off the monster’s arm at the elbow. The clinging claw dropped to the forest floor and smoldered. From his pocket, the old man tossed a hand full of salt in a wide arc at the hounds. Where the salt touched them, it set them to smoldering and bawling from the pain of it. He quickly slapped salt into the wounds on his fore arm and roared his own pain.
Jon was avoiding the claws of the dog soldiers and hacking at anything they shoved in his direction. His blades whirling in a continual stroke, he waded into the biggest concentration of the creatures he could find. He paused only for a second, checking his father’s location, when both wrists were caught by a hulking brute with the head of a mastiff. The claws cut through his arm guards and into his wrists. The pain was like searing hot knives cutting through his tender flesh. He kicked at the creature grabbing at him from behind, while the mastiff suspended him by his wrists. The old man looked at him and barked. Without thinking, Jon reversed both blades in his grip, cutting through the forearms of his captor. The claws fell loose. Jon howled and dealt ruin to the hounds within reach of his deadly blades.
The old man had finished off his canine goons. Leather gear hung in shreds on his heavily panting, powerful frame. Searching desperately, he looked for the shrouded man that called the hounds to this plane of existence. The warlock had obviously fled during the melee. With a sharp downward stroke, he clove the foul smelling brazier in half and stomped out the smoldering coals on the damp forest floor. Leaning heavily on the makeshift altar with muscles bunching in his neck and shoulders, he gave a mighty heave and toppled it. Gasping, he took a moment to catch his breath, and crouched with his hands on his knees. From out of nowhere, a large log hit him squarely between his shoulders and dropped him, face first into the forest loam.
Seeing his father go down, Jonathan resumed his whirling attacks with renewed zeal. He couldn’t get past the cautious mutts who were staying just out of reach of his blades and attacking his exposed sides. His father was trying to get up, but the creatures were closing in on him before he could regain his feet. What if he couldn’t reach his father in time to save him?
It was then a curious sight revealed itself in the eerie red moonlight. All the silver charms and bosses on his father’s accouterments began to gleam with a blue-white light and glowing runic sigils wrapped his duster. From out of the woods, a brilliant blue-white globe the size of a hardball came whistling past him and hit the chief hound squarely between his eyes ripping the monster’s foul head clean from its shoulders. Sundog, his father’s faery friend had shown up in their hour of need.
The old man staggered to his feet, caught his breath and began whirling his remaining blade in a menacing arc around him. The foxfire comet continued launching itself at anything that would dare to approach the wounded wizard.
It seemed like a lifetime for the last of the red tinge to leave the surface of the full moon. It was approaching 1:00 am when the moonlight was clean again. A greasy fog covered the ground as Jon supported his father and limped back to the awaiting vehicles.
Melanie was singing softly to little Gareth, who was feeding at her breast. James was burping Callum and quickly set him in his car seat and jumped to help them as they shuffled towards the four-by-four.
“Hey, guys, what happened?” James inquired. “It sounded like feeding time at the dog pound in there.”
“That sounds about right,” Jon quipped, “except something they tried to eat disagreed with them.”
“I feel like the chew toy from hell!” The old man chortled weakly. “I’m going to need to soak in salt water for a week to clean up this mess.”
“Did you get the witch responsible for the rift tonight?” Mel asked.
“Not for lack of trying, Sis.” Jon groaned. “But we were busier than a three headed fat boy in a candy store. He got away. Dad destroyed his altar and then they almost destroyed Dad. Sundog saved him.”
“Your dad’s not looking very good, Mel,” observed James.
The old man had slumped on the hood of the car and his skin looked unnaturally flushed. He was burning with a fever and soaking wet under his duster and hat.
“How do you feel, Jon?” Mel asked.
“Tired and sick, but I’ll make it,” he replied.
“You and James are going to have to carry him down to Kidron and cool him off in the stream.” Mel directed. “It would probably be wise if you sat and soaked with him when you get him in the water. The healing properties of that stream have resuscitated him from near death before. It can only help.”
They loaded old Storm into the hatch of the four-by-four and hauled him to the park north of the city. On the way, Melanie rubbed a stinging salve into their wounds from a jar in her purse and issued last minute instructions. They parked the vehicle in a cul-de-sac near the woods. Jon and James bundled the unconscious wizard down the trail to the stream. Melanie stayed in the car with the babies and prayed.
At the creek, they peeled off the duster and the hardware from the old man and sat him in a shallow, clay bottomed pool by a mossy bank. Jon stripped down to his jeans and eased in the pool with his father and cleaned the filth and gore from the both of them.
The first light of dawn was beginning to appear on the horizon when the old man regained consciousness.
“Whose idea was it to give me a cold bath in Kidron?” the old man demanded.
“Melanie said it was a sacred spring near Mother’s heart, and would heal you,” Jon replied.
“She’s a great choice for matriarch, don’t you think?” Father Storm smiled weakly, “and I was proud of you out there last night, son. I think the world will have another warrior mage worth his salt.”
“Just like my dad, huh?” Jon spread his arms to show all the wounds he had acquired last night.
“More than you know.” The old man coughed and smiled with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. “So tell me, when someone asks you how you got those scars, what are you going to tell them?”
Jon grinned insanely at his father. So that was the reason for his off the wall explanations. From now on, this would be their private joke. For the next few years, while the army wasn’t deploying him elsewhere, Jonathan would work every technique he had ever learned from his father to the next level. All the confusion made crystal clear, he found himself and his place in the witch clan.
NINJA NIGHTS
The ninja team followed their shidoshi, gum soled tabi moving soundlessly across the packed clay forest trail. To cover their numbers, the five men moved in single file. The shidoshi stopped in his tracks, and spread his arms. This was the signal for the team to melt silently into the surrounding woods. He counted, one, two, and turned to see he was alone. Very good. The practice was going well today, and he would arrive a full half hour early to the rendezvous. The master might well be impressed with his efforts at training these men. But then, the master was a very unpredictable man. If he could truly be called a man. The shidoshi clicked his tongue, in what might sound like a single cricket chirp. He then held his arms out in a crescent shape, and the team silently reappeared on his flanks in a shallow, semi-circle formation known as the deadly Crescent Moon. He was very proud. The men were in top form today. He brought his hands together and pointed forward, and the team fell back into the single file formation.
Jonathan Storm advanced his team to the rendezvous point. Perhaps he would get there before his father, and set up a mock trap with the team. It was almost, too much to hope that they might actually surprise him, but there was never a better trained team to try it with. There was Seth, Goldberg, Jones, and O’Brian in this group. All of them had, at least some military experience. The National Guard, the Marines, and Army Rangers were represented in this group. Jonathan smiled to himself. If nothing else, these men would experience the impossible.
As they were approaching the campsite, Jonathan could smell the faint whiff of a wood fire. He slowed the team down, and entered the area in full stealth mode. There, seated on a log, in front of a smokeless campfire, was the familiar black leather, broad brimmed hat and duster. The old man’s back was to them. Jon spread his arms into a crescent, and the team silently formed at his flanks and began drawing their mock weaponry. Plastic knives and chalked tennis balls appeared in five sets of black gauntleted hands as they formed a silent semi-circle at the master’s back. Within ten feet of their mark they let their weapons fly with devastating effect. The chalk marked the black leather coat, at the points of impact. The hat and coat slumped down on the log, empty of all but the sticks that had held them in place. The team looked on in amazement at the uninhabited hat and coat.
“They NEVER look up,” came a familiar voice from high in the tree, on the other side of the campfire. It was an old ninja proverb. Jon and the team looked up to see the master, dressed in his black ninja gi with the red belt of rank, standing on a branch, about twenty five feet off the ground. The 
old man smiled and waved, as he casually kicked a twelve foot long log, with ropes attached to each end, out of the tree. As the log hurtled earthward, the rope hidden in the underbrush, behind the team, raced to its master, catching the entire ninja team behind their legs and sweeping them onto their backs on the forest floor. Jonathan blinked for only a moment, only to find his father standing in their midst, marking the team with a chalked, wooden sword.
“You’re early,” the master said cheerfully. “That was good planning.”
“I notice that it didn’t help,” Jon said ruefully, brushing himself off.
“To the novice, we say?” prompted the master, cupping one ear to hear.
“Expect the unexpected,” groaned the team in unison.
“To the advanced student, we say?” Storm prompted, yet again.
“BE the unexpected,” they responded.
“Well, I was. Wasn’t I?” the master quipped. “What did you expect?” and he turned to clean off his hat and coat.
* * *
It was a weekend long ninja practice meet. They came out, in minimal ninja equipment, on Friday evening. They would stay Friday night through Sunday afternoon, living off the land and learning not to leave a trace of their existence in the process. True invisibility. They used their short bladed ninja-to as long knives and machetes, to build shelters and tools to harvest wilderness food for survival. The weather was warm, sunny days, with cool, moonlit nights. Even if they made mistakes, they wouldn’t be terribly uncomfortable.
Several pine bough lean-tos sprang up immediately, and a couple tree hammocks, with the small smokeless fire pit Storm had already provided. Some cattail piths, cut with the reeds for bedding, along with some berries, duck potatoes, milkweed greens and sulfur shelves made up an ample dinner, prepared in a half dozen mess kits. The master dug into his duster pockets and pulled forth a fistful of packets of ranch dressing, and some salt and pepper packets that he passed around to the grateful woodland diners. It was his way of telling the boys that he thought they did very well today. Jonathan thought so to, even though they failed to mark his father. They almost never do, but he expects them to always try.
His father believes the advanced warrior must be as much wizard, as warrior. Regardless how well they become such, each will come away knowing something about their world that they didn’t know before. Any food droppings and leftovers would be deposited neatly on a rock, outside the campsite’s perimeter. Some thought it a mystic offering to the woodland spirits, which are said to be plentiful here. The master was familiar with these, but insisted the practice gave the night prowling raccoons and such, a tasty treat and distraction away from the camp itself. The stronger smelling attractants would be in easy reach for them. With ready food, they would be less inclined to dare come closer to the sleeping humans.
Jonathan found ninja practice, an endless source of amusement and comedy. In a dive into the tall grass, Goldberg learned that most important of all lessons, ‘Look before you leap. In that face first dive, while fading soundlessly, if not odorless-ly, into the tall grass, he learned that the lovely white tailed deer he had spied so often, left reminders of their existence, in little piles. He was formally nominated, by his class, for the not-particularly-coveted, Disappearing Circle Award. Seth Balrog, as originator of said award, would be officiating at tonight’s campfire.
Seth was retelling the incident of his first night practice in the woods with Jon and the master. An S.U.V. had appeared on the road in the woods. Jonathan and old Storm seemed to fade out of existence. Suddenly deprived of any night vision, and not knowing the whereabouts of his two companions, he had become disoriented. Seth began running in circles, looking for a place to hide. Dressed in the familiar, black ninja garb, all he really had to do was adjust his posture to disguise his human silhouette, and look down and away from the light, and tuck his fingers so that no skin with recognizable features were exposed. That is what Jon and old Storm had done, and Seth immediately mistook their dark forms for shadowed underbrush. Seth had stopped running in circles when he found a tree to hide behind. As he found it rather suddenly, running into it, he hugged the trunk and hid on the side facing the coming vehicle. Fortunately, his black hooded night suit, rendered him unseen from the truck’s driver, who had his eyes, on the road for crossing animal life. From that point on, they would all joke how Seth had used the mysterious
The campfire story telling then quieted down to the usual ghost stories about ‘The White Lady’, a
“People might think you were antisocial, preferring the darkness, out here, to the campfire,” Jon said quietly. He did not want to disturb the animals nearby.
“People think all sorts of strange things, Jon” his Dad replied in a hushed tone, “Some think I’m a biker. Some think I worship the devil and make blood sacrifices. My mother thinks I’m as evil as my father. It took time, son, but I gave up claiming any responsibility for what people think. I’m comfortable, and I’m where I belong.”
“Living on the edge?” Jon said wryly.
“Yes,” the master said. “...on the edge of their little world, peering into the darkness beyond. I know intimately, those things which go ‘bump-in-the-night’ as it is as much my world as theirs. I am a responsible citizen of more than one world and species. Not fully one or the other, but carrying within, the best of both, as you do.”
“Who are we responsible to?” Jon asked, knowing himself as his father‘s son.
“I thought that would be obvious,” his father chided, “We are responsible to any who are smaller or weaker than ourselves, and to the One who framed the worlds with His Word. To whom much is given, of them, shall much be required.” The old wizard went on, “Doors open into other worlds every day, and who among them, is ready to see it? Some go mad when their ‘reality check’ bounces.” Jon glanced at his father, for his odd quirk with metaphors. His father continued, “For instance, if that foraging skunk at the offering rock, was a rabid wolf instead, who among the human celebrants, huddled around their campfire, would have any idea that they might be stalked by something they can’t see, because their eyes are not adjusted to that kind of light? But you and I, we know what is out here. We belong somewhere between the mysterious and the mundane. That rabid wolf would have much less chance against the likes of us, than ignorant humanity. I say again, I won’t claim responsibility for anything they believe, but I am accountable, before the Maker of Worlds, for what I know, and I station myself accordingly.”
“So this is what makes you the wizard protector?” Jon asked.
“Actually, I was made what I am, and this is what I am best suited to do,” his father explained, “and you as well. The ninja lessons are to train you, not to view war craft and wisdom, as two separate things. Seth and the boys are my tools to train you, and spread a bit of much needed wisdom into the human gene pool. We make better men of them, and I train my son in the process. I am making a force, capable of keeping the worst of the darkness at bay. In so doing, I make the world a little better place to live.”
“I’ve always loved the martial arts, Dad,” Jon said. “I always felt so proud when we went to visit other schools and we’d share knowledge, but I feel very lacking as a wizard, though. It’s like you and Melanie got the best of the magick, and all I got, was card tricks.”
“I won’t lie to you, son,” his father said. “There’s been more than a few times, I wondered if any kind of wizardry was in you. The curiosity was there, but the knowledge seems to take you a bit longer to grasp fully. But when it does, I noticed, you’ve got it. When you drop your own limitations, Seth and the boys, can’t keep up with you. They never will. You are more human than your father, as I am, but considerably less so than them. We are not to be measured or weighed as a full blooded human being. We are LIKE them, but we are not EQUAL. But there’s a bit more to do, to prepare you. Tonight, I would like to initiate you, a bit more fully, into your non-human side.”
“What do you plan on doing?” Jon wondered aloud, “Will we cross over into the Otherworld tonight?”
“No need to,” his father said. “This is a place where it crosses over to us. Over there, you will feel like the alien. Here, you will meet others, remotely like yourself, in ways that humans are not. I’m thinking that if you see similar traits, in creatures that are obviously not human, you will understand that part of yourself, that much better. When the boys bed down for the night, place Seth on camp watch, and you and I will pay the White Lady a little visit. I’ve been needing to introduce you two.” The old man moved back to the campfire and the boys, to boil some water for tea in the kettle of his mess kit. Jon stayed and contemplated the darkness, reaching out of himself for things he felt related to there.
* * *
Every one was bedded down for the night. Seth sat up, by the fire, occasionally tossing a dry stick or twig in to make more light. Flashlights were not allowed in this type of outing. Jon and his father were making their way, in the pitch blackness of the forest, down a trail known as the Emerald Tunnel. This winding trail covered a large distance through the park, along the ridge of a series of hills, through hardwood forest. Its hard packed clay trail was worn smooth over decades of feet and bicycles traveling it. The crabapple trees, hawthorns and wild grape vines formed an arched, emerald ceiling above the trail. When speeding down its winding path, it was like shooting through an emerald tube, thus the name. At night, the light of the moon and stars did not reach here. The glow of fireflies and foxfire were the only illumination to be found. Jon’s father could negotiate these places easily. He followed his father’s black-on-black form southward, to a meadow on a hill, bounded by white oaks.
“Some words of knowledge are in order here,” said the old wizard, as he removed his weaponry to place on a granite bolder in the moonlit meadow. For a brief moment, the men had to squint in the light of the meadow, as their eyes adjusted from the blackness of the forest. After the ‘Emerald Tunnel’, the full moon seemed like high noon. Jon followed his father’s lead and divested himself of weapons at the rock.
“I take it, you plan on having a friendly chat with the White Lady’s ghost,” Jon assumed. “But what about her dogs? Are they safe?”
“When you say ‘ghost,’” his father lectured, “I must assume that you are speaking of the disembodied spirit of another human being.” He pulled his son to face him. “First: the White Lady was never human. She’s fae. She’s a Sidhe (pronounced: SHEE) of an order known as Bean Sidhe, commonly referred to as a ‘banshee’ or the White Sidhe. They are a higher order of faery creature. The human woman form she assumes is one she took from the woman, whose family she had ties to. None of them are left, but the Sidhe remains. As the woman was mistreated in life, this Sidhe is inclined to deal with such predators in the way she deems fit, as this is her ‘haunt.’ It’s not hard to understand why she likes this area, and stays even though the family is gone. She is, in actuality, thousands of years older than the woman, everyone thinks she might be, and has been linked to her family for untold generations.”
“Much as Shabriri and others have been linked to ours?” Jon questioned.
“Precisely so,” said his father, “and the dogs are not white German shepherds. They are white wolves, of a sort. They are not just the animals they would seem to be. They are both guardians and familiars. The mere presence of these, would suggest an even higher order of banshee is what we’re dealing with. In ancient times, such would only accompany a goddess of some degree, and not just a common fae.”
“So she’s ‘nobility?’” Jon asked.
“In
“I’m a little uncomfortable with this and the wolf thing, “Jon said uneasily. “Are you sure we’ll be safe?”
“I never said anything about being safe,” his father corrected. “She doesn’t care much for humans, and doesn’t like men at all. She doesn’t even think too greatly about the intelligence of the women who let themselves be victimized here. It’s her nature to behave as she does.”
“And you want to introduce me to her?” Jon asked, incredulously. “A human eating, man hating, ancient goddess from hell?”
“That’s my point, son.” The wizard continued, “You already know about humans, but very little about that fraction of you that is Sidhe. The White Lady will know you for who you really are. Human or Sidhe. I’m half human, I get along alright.”
“What if I’m not so very Sidhe as you?” Jon queried nervously. “What’re my chances of surviving thus encounter?”
“If there was no chance, son,” his father said softly, “I would not have brought you here at all. You would live your whole life, and never see this part of your heritage. If I erred in my judgment, then I alone, am your chance at surviving this meeting, and my vote here, also counts for something. Just follow my lead. Do not look long in her eyes, but rather look at her feet and be aware of her in your mind. She is a lot easier to look at with your eyes closed, then you see her through less deceived senses. Show no fear, to her or the wolves. They are not corporeal, but they can hurt you, or worse. We won’t give them a reason to, as it is our nature not to be the kind of creature they prey upon. This is where you meet and identify your nonhuman side. That’s why we came here tonight.”
The old wizard directed Jon to remove his tabi, and they both turned and faced the full moon, barefoot, and with their eyes closed. Jon was to visualize a ‘moon goddess’, a feminine aspect of the silvery illumination, as his father suggested and only open his eyes when he felt a feminine presence. A pair of low growls to the right hand and left were Jon’s first clues that they were no longer alone on the hilltop meadow. He was wishing his keen edged, ninja-to was not on the rock, so many feet away. His father began a halting litany in ancient Irish, and the growling subsided. In the moonlight, Jon could make out the clear forms of the white wolves to either side. Their heads were low and their eyes held an unnatural gleam of fire. They made no move to advance. The old wizard was making a fist with his right hand and touched it over his heart, and extended it, palm upwards and open, to the vision of the White Lady, standing before him, as though he was handing her his heart. The Sidhe, in turn, made a motion as if she were picking up, what he offered, and was touching it to her own heart. As she completed this move, the old man declared the meeting would be a safe one. The Sidhe appeared as a lovely, doe eyed, woman in white, and covered in flowing, white, gossamer veils. As Jon studied her features in more detail, he found the image to shift uncomfortably in his mind to something that more than suggested certain, gruesome death. He closed his eyes and bowed his head slightly, and viewed her in his mind. There he saw a luminous creature, that held traits like compassion for innocent victims, and unholy recompense for unrepentant violators of the weak, in an extreme light. Where a human might possess these passions to a mixed extent, in a subdued kind of candle light, this creature had no mixed feelings, and had the glare of an arc lamp, as opposed to a human candle. He could feel her getting closer to scrutinize him more fully. He never felt so naked and vulnerable. His hairs stood erect as if electrified, as her gaze swept him up and down. His knees began to tremble, and Jon was hard put to control them to stop. He could understand, what the fae and his father had in common. But he could not find it in himself, not like this. Then she flooded his mind with visions of women violated and murdered over the centuries. Scene after gruesome, unrelenting scene, imposed themselves on his memories until he could control himself no more and roared his rage to the universe. The spectral wolves howled in an eerie harmony with him. Deep down in his soul of souls, Jon felt that if there was one such person, capable of inflicting that kind of woe on another, he would have to remove such from this plane of existence, without any human remorse. There was none to be found in him. The White Lady seemed to smile at him, but it was a fierce smile. She nodded, and vanished in the mist rising out of the tall meadow grass. Jon sank to his knees, weeping.
“Are you okay, son?” his father asked gently, his hand on his shoulder.
“I never knew I could hate something so much,” Jon sobbed.
“It pleases me to note,” the wizard pointed out, “that it is a ’what’ you hate, and not a ’who.’ There is a time for all things, love as well as hate. All of these have an appropriate place. You’ve never had to make decisions based solely on these things in your past. The Lady felt you alienate yourself from her, and she showed you that given the same choices, you were very much alike. That, and other things, comprise your nonhuman side.”
“It makes me feel lucky I have a human side.” Jon concluded, “I would not want to live so long in a world of such glaring extremes without toning it down a notch.”
“I have to do that all the time.” His father confided, “Sometimes, I feel that such evil moves so easily through this world, and brings such grief to good people, because they allow the evil to get away with it. They tone down justice, when it’s needed undiluted, and then the evil strikes yet again and again. All the time, it is the innocent who are made to suffer for it. It is very difficult for me, to not take matters into my own hands. I have to remind myself, that I do not know ALL of the answers… but what if you saw, what the Lady has seen? How would human justice temper your response?”
“I’m afraid it wouldn’t slow my hand a single second.” Jon glared, “If I knew guilt, beyond any reasonable doubt, that person’s heart would not know another beat. I’m afraid of what I’ve become!”
“You didn’t just become this way, Jon.” His father explained, “She only showed you what was already there. Your passions reflect your Sidhe nature. I married your mother for her very human qualities, the best of such, I could give you. You see exactly why I love her so, and can’t bear to live with her? It‘s the extremes. Our bounds are further stretched than humans. They make things a lot easier to take, with moderation, and yet that same moderation can drive us mad at times, when it seems inappropriate. Only a very obsessed human can relate to a fae wavelength. It‘s not healthy for them in the long run. A healthy Sidhe will burn as bright as a star, for centuries longer than a human and not be hurt by it, but in turn, will lack certain human traits depending upon its archetype. Without these traits to balance one extreme from another, you can understand why a fae living in a human society would wind up wreaking havoc. Some think we were never meant to co-exist, and that hybrids, like ourselves, never meant to exist at all. This is what you need to know about who you are, and how you may expect to be received. It was literally, a life or death decision with the entity you had just met. She’s mellowed a lot since we first met, believe me. She wasn’t likely to accept my fae blood until she could smell it, at first. Having established that, it took decades in our court, working as a protector in her very back yard, that she began to really accept me. They used to have to protect me from her, by not holding court with both of us present at the same time. ”
“I can’t believe you would actually expose me to something like that,” Jon scolded his father.
“Call it, a calculated risk,” the old man grinned. “If I didn’t, you’d take years trying to find that part, and then doubting yourself. If something like what she showed you, happened before your eyes, you would react instantly and in the extreme, and never understand why. Besides that, you’ll never fly without fae help.”
“Dad, I’ve flown Cessnas, Apaches, Chinooks and more,” Jon shook his head. “What do you mean?”
“She gave us a parting gift tonight,” his father said. “They don’t happen all that often, but I love it when they do. Have you ever flown a zephyr?”
Jon looked oddly at his father as they put on their shoes and re-sheathed their weapons in their garb. The old man turned back to face the full moon, and gave a rising whistle and raised his arms, palm upwards. To Jon’s amazement, his father started rising in the wind that whipped at his hair and coat. He rose about thirty feet and motioned his hands downward and began to drift back to the meadow where Jon stood.
“Uh, we’re expected to fly a circuit of the park tonight and discourage vandals and other kinds of bad guys, son,” the old wizard said. “You’ll want to get the hang of this. Signal with your hands, that you want to execute the ascent or descent in your mind. We lose this by sunrise, so let’s get started.”
It seemed too simple, but it worked. His father explained it was the air elementals known as zephyrs, that made this possible for them, and that they were, by nature, very intelligent. In the bright light of the full moon, it was a rush to be carried on the very wings of the wind. It was like a wild dream, except he could feel the cool night wind whipping at his face as they flew. His father pointed north, to the beach area. It must be past midnight, so Jon doubted they would find anyone there. But he was wrong. On the not-so-quiet night time shores of
To say Jon and his father were in high spirits, would have been like saying the great undersea explorer, Jacques Cousteau, dabbled in water. If the fatigue of the day hadn’t been catching up with the pair, they would have fallen out of the sky upon day break. They landed in an open clearing by the stream, near the campsite. They noted, with satisfaction that neither it, nor their fire, was visible from above. Jon watched his father stash the beer bottles under an overhang in the cold stream.
“Is Seth still the youngest of this group?” his father asked.
“Yep, he turned twenty one, some months back,” Jon replied. “Is that beer for later? My mouth is hot and dry from all that screaming.”
“It’s for Saturday night’s campfire time,” his Dad said, “They’ve done real good this year. It’ll be a nice touch. Let‘s go get some sleep.”
* * *
Saturday morning came all too early, the team was up and combing the woods for edibles. Seth had managed to find a few sassafras saplings and yanked up some roots for some hot sassafras tea. The old man pulled some sugar packets out of his voluminous pockets and enjoyed the brew.
“You wouldn’t have some flapjacks and sausages in those pockets of yours, huh?” Seth asked the old man.
“I might surprise you,” the wizard replied enigmatically, and tossed him two sugar packets for his own cup.
* * *
The leftovers were again gathered and taken to the offering stone. The boys broke camp and made the area appear as if they were never there. Practices of the day included sparring on logs over the stream, the loser got wet, and shuriken practice along with knife throwing at some deadwood targets they set up in a clearing. Later in the afternoon, they had water training in one of the many ponds in the back of the park. Canvas ninja gi, swelled up with air bubbles as the boys tied off the thighs and waist to keep them afloat. In the process of exploring the cattailed shrouded back section, the boys caught two perch, about twenty crawfish near the rocks, and a really large snapping turtle. They later released the snapper, because no one remembered exactly how they might prepare the meat. When two more snapping turtles were found to be the size of large wash tubs, it was decided they should clear out of the pond, lest someone lose a limb to the large, amphibious carnivores.
Back at the stream, where it fed into the pond, were numerous flat stones. Searching these, back another hundred yards, yielded another three dozen crawfish. More duck potatoes were dug from the mud close to shore, and the boys mixed some milkweed sap with water to splash on their skin to keep the bugs off. It was a really good day to be out in the woods. A new camp was built, closer to the stream, and when all was to comfort specifications, a hearty meal consisting of steamed crawfish tails and duck potatoes and greens, was prepared.
“These taste like shrimp,” Seth remarked. “You wouldn’t have any cocktail sauce and maybe some cold beer in those pockets of yours, would you? He kidded with the old man.
“No cocktail sauce,” the master replied, rummaging through his pockets, “But I’ve got a few packets of ketchup and some cold beer.”
“Ketchup will do okay,” Seth accepted gratefully, “and WHAT?”
The master reached down, under the overhanging stream bank, and hauled up six bottles of beer, one for each of the amazed ninja trainees. He toasted the men on their fine work and great meal, after which, they thoroughly enjoyed the woodland shrimp dinner with a hearty cold brew.
“So, how did you come up with that beer?” Seth asked the master.
“Magic,” the old wizard grinned.